


Love Strives upon Three Legs

by thesassykels66



Category: Phandom, dan and phil
Genre: Free Verse Poetry, Growing Old, Phan Fluff, alzheimer's
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-22
Updated: 2017-04-22
Packaged: 2018-10-22 12:34:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10697106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesassykels66/pseuds/thesassykels66
Summary: "If forever could be remembered, it would surly hurt less. That the bulbs and flames would have light brought back to them. That you'd still be here with me. But my love, you've been gone for a long time."





	1. Morning

**Author's Note:**

> This is written as free verse poetry. Which explains why many of the words may seem repeated. It's not just for poorly used grammar.  
> But it's something I'm proud of and probably the best thing I've ever written.  
> So enjoy.

What walks on four legs in the morning?   
A baby. It's a metaphor for life, that a child must learn to crawl before they take the first step into life. And that's what our first daughter did. She crawled into our hearts effortlessly. Always smiling and happy and giggly. Our surrogate mother sat on the sofa cheering her on, feeling as part of the family because she was. 

It was the highlight of our life thus far. We had traveled around the world, bought our dream house, caring for two dogs and many, many houseplants; a new life had given the Howell-Lester household new meaning. Each night tangled in arms there was a baby's giggle intertwined with the aura that was love.

A few more years down the road and there was another edition. A little boy, with auburn skin and jet black hair. Who had the best crooked smile, matching the growing rose upon our daughter's cheeks, bows in her hair and sparkling dresses. A beautiful family was grown within our home of four. 

They played ball in the garden with the dogs. They fetched for fireflies and counted stars in the summer grass. They sang songs and flew as high as the planes did. Our children had the brightest imaginations, and beyond the best parents they were ever given. 

And that was when he got even more beautiful. His freckles sharpened, his laugh lines stayed, and his dark brunette hair still swept to the left. 

He caressed my hands more tightly. He kissed me even more gingerly, like I was a fragile object he never dared to let go. He held me more closely than we ever had before. He made sure I was alright. He made sure everything was upright, he made sure all the meals were cooked on time. 

He made sure backpacks were on their hooks. That all the homework was done. That story time was necessary. He made sure that Daddy and Papa were always on task. That somehow making videos were still our number one source of income. That our children were bigger stars than ourselves in our hay day. 

He made sure that life was good. Everyone was happy and quaint which included our still growing online audience. We had fun with the blessings we were given. We made sure that slivers of our perfect life were left on the Internet for everyone to see. 

He made sure he knew I loved him. That I knew he loved me more than the stars loved the night sky. He made sure that our bond was eternal. He made sure that a silver band around my finger meant forever. 

It was a shame that forever could never be remembered.


	2. Afternoon

What walks on two legs in the afternoon?   
An adult. Make it two adults, and that was our children. Sent off to university and learning on their own, we eventually became empty-nesters. 

Growing old, we eventually called an end to our years of endless video making. Our audience had grown into lives of their own, and they wished us the best like we did for them. 

We retired well before the age of sixty-five. Watching silly romantic comedies until the late evening, slow dancing with candles burning in the dining room, it was silly what he and I did in our elder years. It wasn't much different from our youth. 

I fell in love with him again like I did all those years ago. When we were so young, when we were still faces on a screen. When nightly forehead kisses weren't a thing. When board game nights were shared with drinks. When the Manchester Eye was still rotating. 

He made me feel young every second of every day. His brown eyes would spark every morning that matched his brewed coffee. His wrinkled skin and wavering voice still made my heart thud out of sync. When he would place his lips upon mine randomly. When he would still rein victory in car racing games and do the same pointed-tongued gesture in my direction to rub it in. 

He still made sure I knew he loved me. He made sure well into our fifties, into our sixties. Until one morning, he stopped. 

The signs started early, and it was a pin poke to my beating heart. He started to wander, he would daydream and talk nonsense. Even more than the usual. Well into the night he would wander. His greying form always wandering. 

He wandered until he got lost. In aisles and alleys, in his own mind that was always drifting. He wandered off to a different part of town one night, scaring me near to death. Talking to policemen never settled the weariness, I ended up calling our son who was out until the dawn finding his feathering father in his oblivion. 

It grew hard on the nights where he wouldn't hold me close. Where he wouldn't let me touch him. Where he never made sure he knew I loved him. It was hard on the nights I held tears in my eyes he would say he had forgotten my name. 

It broke my heart when he would throw fits in his old age. It broke my heart when he refused to hold a man's hand. It broke my heart when he slowly went mad. 

It broke my heart to see him being restrained. Being taken away from me. Be taken away from the life we built together. 

Sorrow drew over my shoulders. I had so much sadness I didn't know what to do with. My light was taken out of every bulb, every flame, every sun beam that would leak upon the wood floor. The love of my life was forgetting every detail that was our love, our life. 

The days where he remembered were the most hopeful. He would spring into my arms panting my name into my ear. I'd cling onto every minute, every second of him being with me. Every nanosecond he'd allow himself to be him. When he'd finally kiss me again after months of refusal brought me to my knees. The days where he'd wipe my tears with his thumbs and kiss my forehead with his cracked lips. 

His eyes never changed. The light in them was always there, he was still the boy I kissed at the train station. The boy who messaged me non stop. The boy I fell in love with. He was still very much the boy who took my hand and promised me to love me forever. But he never remembered that. His eyes held the words that were caged behind the film of his foggy mind. 

He'd shake within my arms. He'd push me away and scream. He'd deny me knowing his name. He'd scream and cry because of the nurses pinning him down. His knuckles would bleed from punching things. His nose and mouth looped with tubes keeping him breathing. 

My whole world crashed and burned in front of my eyes and disintegrated within my hands. The days he no longer saw me as his husband but just his funny friend were the days I dreaded the most. 

There were days he was okay with me telling him our stories as young Internet sensations. He'd laugh at our old jokes; internally pleading with him to come back to me. There were days were he'd let me read to him and show him pictures of us on our world tour. He'd let me sing to him our many songs we created together, but he could never learn the words again. 

He let our children visit and bring gifts and his favorite chocolates. He let them kiss his cheeks and say what they admired most about their father who wasn't with them anymore. He felt sorrow for the children who never got to say goodbye to their father properly. 

Our grandchildren never officially got to meet their loving and adoring grandfather I knew they needed. 

He watched me cry more than he should have. He never comforted me like he used to. He never made me laugh, all he did was hurt me. It wasn't his fault, he had no meaning behind it. 

The days he refused to see me where the hardest to get over. I claimed a chair by the stone fireplace in the foyer and slept. The nurses and friendly doctors begged me to go home but I never did. I hoped that by some miracle that my Dan would come back to me. That he would wander back into my heart where he belongs. That my dying breath can be heard by the Dan who loved me. 

Our daughter eventually forced me home to the big empty house where the dogs' water bowls were still out. Even though they had been long gone before his wandering mind. She stayed for a while to make sure I would eat and dress myself properly. She would sing and play the piano to me sometimes. A gift that was passed down from him I never got over. She kissed my forehead just like he would, but it felt different. My own adult daughter would tuck me into my own bed and wish me sweet dreams. The same daughter whose diapers I changed. Who loved to jump off the banister in her bare bum as her Daddy would catch her. 

Her hugs felt like his. She was the same temperature as he used to be. She would cry her soul onto her Papa's jumper. My shaking hands couldn't cure her broken heart because they couldn't cure mine. 

Our son joined in during the summer. He would do the gardening as we waited for the visiting hours to be acceptable again. That we as a family filtered in one by one to greet our greying friend yet again. 

At the point of ten years he wasn't able to sit up  by himself anymore. That the number of visits were limited. That my heart still ached for his light touch upon my back. I just wanted something reassuring to come from him. But nothing came. 

Our last good day was when he said my name again. When he hadn't said it in years. He didn't remember me, but he kept saying, "Phil. I like the name Phil." And he would smile that made his eyes crinkle, that his wrinkly dimple was still visible. He had me in shambles again and he would just chuckle at the old fool in the corner of his room crying by the window. 

The first day the sun was shining in months was the day I wish I could forget. It wasn't warm, it wasn't in the middle of the summer, it wasn't a perfect day to holiday. It was a day where his sheets were empty. His slippers still on the floor. His ring on his nightstand. His unfinished book sat right next to his half empty glass. 

I held the hands of our two children we raised. I felt the sympathy of the millions that used to follow us, knowing they could feel the loss upon their shoulders. I felt even more empty than when my own brother and parents had passed on. 

My entire world had been gone for a while, but now there was no conclusion of him coming back. No proper way to say goodbye. And within that small room that nursed my forgotten husband, was our now family of three.


	3. Evening

What walks on three legs in the evening?  
It was me. A frail, lonely old man whose life had been taken away from a higher being he wasn't sure he believed in. Walking with a cane for years, it was a necessity in order to walk again. 

We always joked on who would go first. That anytime we passed a cemetery I would crack the "everyone's dying to get in" joke. We used to contemplate death in our youth. When we were no where near it. 

We used to walk down the same streets together, just talking about our days. We would be stopped by viewers asking for pictures from two guys they would make their days a bit brighter.  We genuinely enjoyed what we did for periods of our life. 

I used to read his own words to him, and he failed to recognize the sarcasm. I would play video games with him until the nurses would take them away. I even snuck in a bag of McDonald's because he just wanted some chips that weren't baked in a toaster oven. 

He was still my Dan, deep down. His brown eyes even grew pale, but they were still his eyes. His laugh was still the same, his hair, his hands, his mannerisms. The only thing that didn't seem to fade was his use of vocabulary. He was still Dan. 

We were hoping we'd go together like some sort of romantic comedy scheme. At many times in nights sat by the fireplace I prayed for a Notebook style type of ending.  Unfortunately such events never play out like you hope they do. 

We both had decided we wanted to be cremated when we went. That his legacy to not be on fire would ironically follow him to the grave. But to have him be put on a shelf in our home was too daunting. I told our children to wait until I went to spread the ashes, that way when we finally go we go together. 

He sits in a place we agreed to house us if one left earlier than the other. That his name is engraved in gold, fresh flowers outlining the edges of the stone. Some notes and photographs of our audience were left for respect. Family members always were at our doorstep. I palmed the cool marble, feeling him sarcastically complain about his dead body still inside a box within a box. That he had some weird existential monologue about the afterlife in whatever galaxy his spirit is traveling to. That his life was meaningless and pointless in the grand scheme of the universe. But not to me, not to our children, and not to millions of others. 

He was inspiring. A loud lovable mass of a human who was awkward with everyday ordeals. Who could give life to an unhappy spirit in seconds. Who gave warm bear hugs. Who played with your hair when you were poorly. Who loved to hum his way through life. Who loved to laugh and tell funny stories about himself. To hold his newborn daughter and cry non stop at the miracle of life and how amazing life actually is. Whose heart's capacity was at no number could rate;

Daniel James Howell-Lester. 

The one thing I never told our kids though, was why my cane was always wobbly. Why I always refused to replace it. Being stubborn didn't always allow me to win, but in this case it did. Because this cane was hand carved with a removable bottom. And within that removable bottom is just a little sprinkles of him to stabilize my feet on this earth. That wherever I go he's with me. 

He's the balance I never asked for but also something I could not live without. 

That I spent the majority of many, many years with one other significant person. Daniel Howell. And it's only fair that he gets to continue to venture my last leg of life with me.


End file.
